Tinubu, SW governors and Buhari’s jackboot democracy

By Tunde Abatan
These are indeed interesting times in Nigeria.it is interesting because the country is seeing the manifestation of the political waters muddled since the emergence of President Muhammadu Buhari as President of Nigeria in 2015.
The reasons for this muddled political waters,which has never been since the emergence of the country as an independent nation, has complicated the proper analysis of the likely result of the political scenario both now and in the foreseeable future. Never since this nation came forth has governance been so deliberately skewed to project and put a ruling tribe over and above other ethnic groups that made up the country.The government jettisoned the need for nurturing the nations diversity and harmony in its skewed appointments.
The signal for what is happening now showed early in the life of the administration and those who could see I to the future could explain why the development in the country today took its roots since the inauguration of President Buhari on May 29,2015.
One would have expected that a government that rode to power after the floating of an omni bus alliance of strange political bedfellows from especially the reactionary North West and South West part of the country will birth a government reflective of a new thinking and political re- awakening of stretching hands of fellowship across the North and South.
In this regard,the early signals of the repudiation of such in policy and governance is the delay by President Buhari in constituting his cabinet for six months.
Indeed,in a rather surprising declaration,Asiwaju Bola Tinubu,the arrowhead of the birth of All Progressives Congress,APC,himself spoke loudly when he declared to a bewildered nation that he had told the President he shouldn’t look for angels to form his cabinet.
Perhaps,a trusting Tinubu, never reckon with the fact that Buhari was cleverly strategizing,even if it means affecting the nations economy, but got pre occupied in his bid to identify loyal men and women,from his tribal enclave who will execute his ‘unseen agenda’ which he had kept close to his chest.
At the end of the six months waiting,it became clear to all and sundry what plans President Buhari had by allocating all the strategic defence positions,ministries and parastatals to the conservative elements from his part of the country for obvious reasons.
Even when such appointees fail to perform and deliver on his campaign promises,the leaders of the political class from the South West kept mum.
Nobody from Tinubu to Vice President Yemi Osibajo and other party leaders spoke on the need to implement Restructuring,,,one of the key campaign promises while insecurity heightened by murderous Fulani herdsmen….the President’s kinsmen, which first reared its ugly head in Benue state.
Even when Governor Samuel Ortom cried out loud for all to hear,he was dubbed anti APC and subtly shown the way out. But to confirm his relevance in his state,he won his reelection on the platform of the opposition PDP….an indication he is popular with his people.
What is more, another leg of Buharis decapitation of the APC manifested in the refusal of the party till date to constitute the Board of Trustees,BOT, which Tinubu as national leader was touted to head.
Yet,the SW leaders kept mum and choose to play political correctness in order not to rock the boat ,at least to give Buhari a second term.
In another vein,the silence of the APC leaders from the SW to prevail on the President to implement the report of the Governor El Rufais committee report on Restructuring is a silent endorsement of President Buharis refusal to have anything to do with Restructuring…an issue on which Tinubu and others convinced the SW to vote for Buhari and forget his legendary anti peoples attitude and reactionary postures especially when he vowed never to touch the report of the 2014 Constitution at conference. Had late Alhaji Lam Adesina, former Governor of Oyo state been around,his attitude to this strange culpability of the APC South West leaders would been interesting considering his encounter with Buhari as a result of Fulani herders excesses while he was Governor.
The silence of Tinubu on the abdication Restructuring, the core objective of ‘rail roading’ the SW into supporting Buhari from all indications gave the later dictatorial stance with which he has now caged the party and indeed the clamour for Restructuring.
For choosing to play along and keep quiet for Buhari to get a second term,the leaders are now reaping the price of what they have sown.
Had they impressed it on Buhari before gullibly jumping into the second term train,maybe the audacity and hegemonic stance of Buhari and his followers in the Congress for Political Change,CPC,one of the parties in the alliance which brought the APC together , and which tendency have cornered strategic and juicy positions in government agencies.This move by Buhari and his CPC travellers was a clever one done ostensibly to pursue Buharis domineering and hegemonic agenda.
On this score,Abubakar Atiku,in spite of his shortcomings of jumping from one political bed to another is the wiser today.He once declared that he told Tinubu he would regret backing Buhari in 2015.Though,the regrets Atiku predicted may not be loud, but it is evident.
Beside Atiku,former Senate President, Iyorchia Ayu,a middle belt political leader whose tribe have seen and experienced Fulani political manipulation couched in grand deceit also saw today.
He declared matter of factly that like Atiku did in 2015 when the APC was being put together,that Tinubu is in bed with the most reactionary elements from the North.
Today,he is wiser while Tinubu who thought albeit wrongly, that only North West and North East votes could take power from the former President Good luck Jonathan’s Peoples Democratic Party,PDP, has been beaten in his game.
Another strategic master stroke used by Buhari and his CPC against Tinubu and the SW leaders who either cannot see through or are playing for time,is the gradual encouragement of schisms in the SW flank of the APC.This has been surreptitiously done through Governors of Ondo,Ekiti in person of Arakunrin Akeredolu and Dr Kayode Fayemi.While the former had to struggle it out with Tinubus candidate to get a second term using Abujas foot soldiers,Fayemis touted Presidential ambition ostensibly draw a wedge between him and Tinubu.
Besides,leading APC senators from SW like Ibikunle Amosun and a host of other political leaders are still heart and head with Buhari being members of his CPC club now being reactivated all over the country.
They have the resources having occupied strategic military and juicy parastatals to mop up funds for CPC when the chips are down and Tinubu withholds his purse string.
On the third flank,the emergence of new caratekaer of the APC after the humbling of former Chairman,Adams Oshiomole,in person of Governor Buni of Yobe state marked a significant turning point in the cutting of the political wings of Tinubu in the APC and emasculation of his political reach, influence and touted ambition for 2023.
Bunis role so far have focused on winning to the APC governors, from other parties and strengthening it if and when Tinubu display enough courage to leave the party on which he unarguably used his fortune and vast contact to build.
Divorcing Tinubu from control over APC starting from his SW zone to the minority in South South and also reaching out to the South East is obviously a strategic game to rebuild APC and have an edge when Tinubu eventually throw his hat into the 2023 Presidential contest.
But the emergence of the separatist movement in the South West led by Professor Banjo Akintiye on the intellectual wing deploying his vast international contacts and activist, Sunday Adeyemo Igboho ostensibly leading the militant wing has become another headache for SW leaders.
Igbohos emergence on the scene was promoted by growing insecurity in his Igangan,Oyo North enclave and other parts of the region also helped to boost separatist agitators in the region.
Before now,separatist move, which is hitherto alien to SW since before and even after the civil war period (1967-1970), and Tinubus silence on the issue in spite of the effect on the lives of agrarian SW is perhaps the biggest headache confronting him and a host of SW leaders who are neither here nor there.
With the rekindling of strong Oduduwa bond across the elite and grassroot class in the Yoruba speaking areas of the country,politics can never be the same again.
Since security issues cuts across political class or groupings,the sympathy among the Yoruba which was last displayed during the Action Group crisis of the first republic when late Premier ,Chief Obafemi Awolowo was imprisoned and the deannulment campaign of June 12 1993 presidential election,the region has never witnessed such a nationalistic fervour now being experienced with Odua Republic clamour.
Across the political divide in the region,the question is whether you are for Oduduwa Republic or not.
This is the more reason why the meeting in Lagos last Sunday May 23 of three governors,Speaker of the House of Representatives and key stakehokders of the region including interim APC Chairman,Chief Bisi Akande, former Governor Olusegun Osoba,Senator Akinyelure and General Alani Akinrinade with other APC political stakeholders might have further put a stumbling block to Tinubus ambition.
The communique in paper was neither here nor there.
Tinubus non committal statement on activities of rampaging and murderous Fulani herdsmen in the region and the absence of Governors of Ekiti and Ondo state is a clear pointer to a divided house.
While Governor Akeredolu denied supporting Oduduwa Republic agitators,his role in declaration of Southern governors banning open cattle grazing in the South and the hoopla it has generated has caught APC leaders in the middle of the game.
Hence,the two pronged communique issued by the APC and other stakeholders to disown secessionist agitation in one breadth and support power devolution which Buhari has refused to take steps to implement in another breadth,is seen as a decision coming too late when the horse has bolted from the stable.
That Tinubu and the leaders kept mum on Restructuring for six years but have to wait for non state actors and opposition PDP to seize the momentum,it is doubtful whether the centre can hold again politically in the politicaly conscious and sophisticated region.
What is more,with some undercover support by traditional rulers and surreptitious encouragement by governors in the region some of which may belong to the APC, it is doubtful whether things can be the same again in the region for APC.
The increasing level of insecurity and it’s far reaching effects,youthful unemployment, parlours state of the economy and growing disenchatment with the injustice and lack of equity in governance especially at the federal level, the present political leadership in the region are up to an uphill task in reigning in the people including their members to support a party and government which has disappointed them on all fronts.The apparent and clear threat to the live of a highly upwardly mobile citizenry whose sons and daughters abroad have signed into and contributing resources into the birth of an independent Yoruba nation judging by tremendous supports for self determination movements.The signs are too omnious fir a political change of followers hip at least to resist the invaders.
The stakes are really high indeed.
For Tinubu to have donated N50million to victims of ethnic clashes in the North and leaving behind Yoruba victims in Oyo state also speaks volumes of political miscalculation. Like the Yoruba adage,Oni eni ko le se idi bebere,ma fi ileke si idi elomiran,it is doubtful whether there won’t be repercussions.when you leave your kinsmen and take care of migrants who are from the North speaks volume of wrong political moves. In this season and time when a people consider themselves used and sidelined by a government seen as enthroning bigotry on all fronts much remains to be seen in the dangerous political quagmire the SW APC leaders have found themselves.